Its like you took the words right out of my brain.

We all need to put ourselves in the mindset that we deserve to be happy no matter what our shape or size and then take all that additional happiness that comes with getting healthy as a well deserved bonus

no, I don't let it bother anyone. as Stella said, I am AWESOME and everyone should want me. lol.

To perhaps play the devil's advocate, I don't think I want a man who is happy with a woman who's not happy with herself.

Well, to be honest, I have a fantasy that the right man will come along, who can see past all my crap into the real me, and make everything all better - but that is of course nonsense.

On the other hand, we all deserve to be happy with ourselves, regardless of our weight. I think that being unhappy with our weight and being unhappy with ourselves are two very different things. Weight does not equal self.

Getting involved with someone who is unhappy with their self is a pretty risky thing. Because I think if a person is unhappy with their self, then they don't really know who they are yet. Becoming a happy person tends to involve a lot of soul searching and personal change. So, if you get involved, you don't really know what you're getting into! At least to some degree.

But I'd like to stress that being unhappy with your weight does not have to mean disliking yourself. I think the two get mixed up for at least a couple reasons:

Obviously, society equates them.

But also, sometimes the reasons we're fat *are* the reasons we don't like ourselves. Not always.

I met my husband when I was thinner than I am now, but still at the very least 230+. He was SKINNY. I mean super skinny (probably too skinny!), but he never paid a moment of attention to my weight. This made me really skeptical at first. I mean how do you not notice how BIG I am? But it just truly did not matter to him. We fell in love and have been ever since. We have two gorgeous babies and are still as in love as ever.
I have to stress though, when I met him I had really come into myself for the first time ever. In the year previous I had gotten out of a very bad relationship that had spanned several years (I was 16 when we met, he was my manager and 10 years older...it was off and on for about 5-6 years), dealing with several health issues and had moved back in with my parents to regroup and got a handle of myself. It was during this time that I started to go out with friends, have fun and see myself as more than just a # on the scale. I was truly happy being me and I think that really showed.
So I agree with Julie that it is important to love yourself, not neccessarily your size, but yourself...before you get into a relationship.

Just so you know, Julie. It's actually not nonsense for everybody. I didn't flirt often, occasionally in high school I did. But mostly I was always oblivious to when I guy was genuinely interested. Mostly because I didn't have a lot of confidence, I wasn't pretty, and I didn't really consider myself to be a catch. As I got older, my life seemed to spiral out of control. I was making decisions because I knew my mother would approve of them but I was deciding to do things that I didn't want to do. I felt like I was useless, wasting my life, and was incredibly depressed. While I loved the me inside, nobody got to see that me because I was always walking on eggshells trying to please everybody else. Trying to be the good daughter, the good employee, the good student, the good friend. And somewhere in all that mess, my dreams and hopes and desires kept getting shoved further and further to the wayside. I actually met my husband at the lowest point in my life. He'd been coming through my line at the shoppette where I worked for six months, buy random things and flirting with me, trying to get the courage up to ask me out. I never noticed. When he gave me his number and offered to take me out to dinner so I could relax (I was particularly stressed that day 'cause I was pulling an 8 hour night shift after taking two finals that day) it took me two weeks to screw up any kind of courage to talk to him.

I ended up giving him my number one night after I'd had a huge argument with my mother who was trying to tell me who I could and could not be friends with at 22. I happened to be restocking the liquor that evening and realized that a large reason I'd never tried alcohol up to that point was that I was terrified that if I did, I'd get drunk enough to do something terribly irreversible. I walked home in tears over the realization of how miserable I was. And along the way, my phone rang. DH and I talked for a good five hours that night and, work and deployments aside, we've been pretty inseparable ever since. More importantly, I am finally happy.

All because he did see past all my crap, he did see the real me, and he did make it better by letting me be the real me and loving me because of it (the real me), not in spite of it. Not that everybody is this lucky. I know that. I'm just saying sometimes, those things you read about in books and see in romantic comedy/dramas do actually happen in real life.

thank you for sharing that story, it gave me just exactly the right kind of warm fuzzy feeling.

garnetrising: That is one of the greatest stories I've heard. It's nice to know that some people really do get the fairytale guy. Thanks for sharing!

All I can say is as you get older it gets MUCH better. Well it seems to anyway. I'm 27 and when I was in my early twenties weighing about the same a I do now, guys at school ignored me(as in they didn't even want to help me find the correct class....JERKS!) But now men are much more receptive to conversation, therefore they get to know ME.Of course I'm married so who knows if any of these men are interested in me that way for sure, still they are a **** of a lots nicer and 27 than they were at 21.

I think lots of guys are interested in personality, much more than looks, of course looks are important but most people don't look as bad as they think they do. Also guys worry about their looks too.

Also you have to shop in your league. You know, are you a 6 (looks, personality wise) and chasing after a 10? If so you going to have to work very hard. They have actual studies on this sort of thing.

What's that sound? Oh, just a 50 something crashing the thread.

1. Weight should not be a barrier to being yourself. You are fabulous. Really! And anyone that thinks otherwise isn't worth your time and attention.

2. Don't wait - get out there NOW. Using your weight as an excuse - is - well - just wrong. EVERY person out there has something they don't like about themselves. This habit of thinking you aren't worthy of dating/flirting because of your weight is dangerous.

What happens when you get to your perfect weight and you still have saggy skin, or the girls are droopy, or your knees look too knobby? C'mon - don't make excuses in order to stave off possible rejection. The cost is too high. Put on your thickest skin and get out there!

3. Stealing from the title of my goal story, "Don't Wait - your life is calling!"

I don't really let it affect my dating life a whole lot. Although, there have been times people have told me that they were attracted to me and I was pretty oblivious. And sometimes when they're very attractive women I say, "what me? noo, you can do so much better" and make some reference to my weight. They usually tell me something along the lines of "but I love curvy women". To be quite honest, I've had lots of beautiful women interested in me.